How To Do Athens On A Shoestring

How To Visit Athens: A Guide For Travellers With No Time & No Money

If all the Instagram pics of Lisbon, the official Millennial-City-Break-Location-Of-Choice-2017, are starting to look a bit samey then consider instead boarding a budget airline for a trip to Athens.

Greece is catching up on its western Europe counterparts in terms of visitors – 2015 saw the country's tourism grow "two to three times faster" than Spain, France, Portugal and Italy. 4.5 million people were predicted to visit Athens alone in 2016.

It's a miracle for a city still raw from the events of the past few years. The 2008 riots kicked off years of unrest; Greece was terribly affected by the economic crash and the youth, feeling disenfranchised, fought back.

As it is, Athens boasts an incredible youth population. They are alternative, political, music- and art-obsessed. And it's written all over the face of the city, from the graffiti in the "anarchist" neighbourhood of Exarcheia, to the experimental food and drink served in intellectual cafés across the city, to the groundbreaking art in the EMST Museum and elsewhere. It's a city that deserves to be explored.